Hi folks!
We have a 'situation' for F27 Final that needs resolving.
One blocker bug - https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1164492 -
definitely requires a change to gnome-boxes. That change isn't under
dispute, and is present in an update, gnome-boxes-3.26.1-4.fc27 .
So what's the problem? The problem is that update also includes
*another* change, and I'm not at all sure we actually still want that
change.
gnome-boxes-3.26.1-3.fc27 changed the default video adapter for new VMs
to 'virtio', as an attempt to workaround
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1491320 . However, that bug
now appears to be addressed on the kernel side. Changing the default
video adapter for new VMs could only ever be an incomplete workaround
(it wouldn't help VMs created on other OSes, or existing VMs, or
various other situations), and I believe was a downstream-only change.
So do we still actually want to change Boxes' default video adapter for
F27? If not, can someone please build and submit a 3.26.1-5.fc27 update
which includes the dependency change for #1164492, but reverts the
virtio default video adapter change? Thanks!
--
Adam Williamson
Fedora QA Community Monkey
IRC: adamw | Twitter: AdamW_Fedora | XMPP: adamw AT happyassassin . net
http://www.happyassassin.net

Hi folks!
We have a 'situation' for F27 Final that needs resolving.
One blocker bug - https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1164492 -
definitely requires a change to gnome-boxes. That change isn't under
dispute, and is present in an update, gnome-boxes-3.26.1-4.fc27 .
So what's the problem? The problem is that update also includes
*another* change, and I'm not at all sure we actually still want that
change.
gnome-boxes-3.26.1-3.fc27 changed the default video adapter for new VMs
to 'virtio', as an attempt to workaround
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1491320 . However, that bug
now appears to be addressed on the kernel side. Changing the default
video adapter for new VMs could only ever be an incomplete workaround
(it wouldn't help VMs created on other OSes, or existing VMs, or
various other situations), and I believe was a downstream-only change.

AFAIK virtio-vga definitely is the most future proof choice, it is what
we want to switch to one of these days anyways. Since this will only
impact new VMs and since once created VMs may stick around for quite
a while I think that having virtio-vga as a default for the video
adapter is a good idea.
Anyways just my 2 cents.
Regards,
Hans

>
> So what's the problem? The problem is that update also includes
> *another* change, and I'm not at all sure we actually still want that
> change.
>
> gnome-boxes-3.26.1-3.fc27 changed the default video adapter for new VMs
> to 'virtio', as an attempt to workaround
> https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1491320 . However, that bug
> now appears to be addressed on the kernel side. Changing the default
> video adapter for new VMs could only ever be an incomplete workaround
> (it wouldn't help VMs created on other OSes, or existing VMs, or
> various other situations), and I believe was a downstream-only change.

Exactly. The main reasoning we still didn't pushed for this switch
upstream is the compatibility with other distros. To be honest, we
haven't researched enough to safely state that switching from QXL to
VIRTIO upstream is not going to break other systems.

AFAIK virtio-vga definitely is the most future proof choice, it is what
we want to switch to one of these days anyways. Since this will only
impact new VMs and since once created VMs may stick around for quite
a while I think that having virtio-vga as a default for the video
adapter is a good idea.

Indeed. There's no doubt that we want virtio-vga asap, the question is
when (depending on the issues users have experienced, if any).
We could also switch existing VMs if that's desired. But, as Hans
mentioned, now we are setting VIRTIO only for newly created VMs.
I have no strong reasons to carry or drop the patch, this way I'd
probably decide together with you all in this thread.

Hi!
(re-sending with another email :) )
On Tue, Oct 31, 2017 at 9:11 AM, Hans de Goede <hdegoede(a)redhat.com&gt; wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On 30-10-17 22:41, Adam Williamson wrote:
> >
> > Hi folks!
> >
> > We have a 'situation' for F27 Final that needs resolving.
> >
> > One blocker bug - https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1164492 -
> > definitely requires a change to gnome-boxes. That change isn't under
> > dispute, and is present in an update, gnome-boxes-3.26.1-4.fc27 .
Thanks Adam for initiating this discussion.
> >
> > So what's the problem? The problem is that update also includes
> > *another* change, and I'm not at all sure we actually still want that
> > change.
> >
> > gnome-boxes-3.26.1-3.fc27 changed the default video adapter for new VMs
> > to 'virtio', as an attempt to workaround
> > https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1491320 . However, that bug
> > now appears to be addressed on the kernel side. Changing the default
> > video adapter for new VMs could only ever be an incomplete workaround
> > (it wouldn't help VMs created on other OSes, or existing VMs, or
> > various other situations), and I believe was a downstream-only change.
Exactly. The main reasoning we still didn't pushed for this switch
upstream is the compatibility with other distros. To be honest, we
haven't researched enough to safely state that switching from QXL to
VIRTIO upstream is not going to break other systems.
>
> AFAIK virtio-vga definitely is the most future proof choice, it is what
> we want to switch to one of these days anyways. Since this will only
> impact new VMs and since once created VMs may stick around for quite
> a while I think that having virtio-vga as a default for the video
> adapter is a good idea.
Indeed. There's no doubt that we want virtio-vga asap, the question is
when (depending on the issues users have experienced, if any).
We could also switch existing VMs if that's desired. But, as Hans
mentioned, now we are setting VIRTIO only for newly created VMs.
I have no strong reasons to carry or drop the patch, this way I'd
probably decide together with you all in this thread.

I don't mind going with the switch, if you guys are fine with it. I
just wanted to check. If that's the case, we can just go ahead and use
3.26.1-4.fc27 in the final compose, no further build is necessary.
Thanks.
--
Adam Williamson
Fedora QA Community Monkey
IRC: adamw | Twitter: AdamW_Fedora | XMPP: adamw AT happyassassin . net
http://www.happyassassin.net

Hi folks!
We have a 'situation' for F27 Final that needs resolving.
One blocker bug - https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1164492 -
definitely requires a change to gnome-boxes. That change isn't under
dispute, and is present in an update, gnome-boxes-3.26.1-4.fc27 .
So what's the problem? The problem is that update also includes
*another* change, and I'm not at all sure we actually still want that
change.
gnome-boxes-3.26.1-3.fc27 changed the default video adapter for new VMs
to 'virtio', as an attempt to workaround
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1491320 . However, that bug
now appears to be addressed on the kernel side. Changing the default
video adapter for new VMs could only ever be an incomplete workaround
(it wouldn't help VMs created on other OSes, or existing VMs, or
various other situations), and I believe was a downstream-only change.
So do we still actually want to change Boxes' default video adapter for
F27? If not, can someone please build and submit a 3.26.1-5.fc27 update
which includes the dependency change for #1164492, but reverts the
virtio default video adapter change? Thanks!

Felipe's email is waiting in the moderation queue, but he basically says he
has no preference either way. I'd personally keep the patch in (use
virtio-vga), because I see only benefits and no drawbacks. It's the more
future-proof solution. I wish we could do the same for virt-manager.